Gaza: War remnants and unexploded ordnance (UXO) are obstructing the restoration of normal life in the Gaza Strip, with children being the most vulnerable to danger as they may inadvertently touch these devices unaware of their risks, said Head of the UN Mine Action Programme in the Palestinian territories, Julius van der Walt.

According to Qatar News Agency, Walt warned that UXO poses profound risks to civilians as hundreds of thousands of them poured into Gaza following the ceasefire deal. More than two years of Israeli occupation attacks on the Gaza Strip have caused widespread contamination of UXOs, which deleteriously affect delivery of humanitarian aid, decelerate the recovery of the enclave, profoundly expose rebuilding operations to risks, and pose a direct threat to human lives, Walt noted.

He clarified that UN operation teams are risking their lives due to explosives on a daily basis across various regions of the Palestinian enclave, with families pouring into Gaza and exposing themselves to the risk of these unexploded devices. There are no accurate data about the entire volume of explosive device contamination in Gaza, with strong indications suggesting that they are widely spread across multiple areas, he cautioned, emphasizing that the vast majority of these devices are either UXOs or manually manufactured explosive devices.

The UN official indicated that the tiny swath of Gaza and the surging population density make the situation more complicated than in other conflict zones such as Syria and Lebanon.